


Herbalist’s Tasks II

by Lyrial



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Comedy, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-09
Updated: 2013-05-09
Packaged: 2017-12-10 21:19:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/790277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyrial/pseuds/Lyrial
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hawke and company set off on an epic quest of earth-shattering importance. The fate of Kirkwall is in their hands and failure is simply not an option. After all, how hard can it really be to find some small blue flowers for Solivitus on the Wounded Coast?</p>
<p>(Spoiler: very)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Herbalist’s Tasks II

The Wounded Coast looked as it always did.

White, white, more white and some green, plus the occasional brownish red splotches that appeared upon the landscape whenever Hawke decided to redecorate with his enemies’ essential anatomical components- and those enemies were certainly numerous. It seemed Hawke and his merry band of misfits could barely take a step upon the pearly white sands of the Wounded Coast before being jumped by anything that could move. Mabari hounds, Tal-Vashoth warriors, random bandits, shades and demons, you name it, it was there, slumming it out on the Wounded Coast. It was as though the entire unsavory population of Kirkwall had decided upon a mass exodus to the beach for some much-needed sunshine.

However, despite all the manifest charms of the Wounded Coast, the group of tired and hungry men who were trailing dejectedly behind Hawke was apparently immune to the many wonders of the beach. In fact, these men could almost be described as being… extremely displeased. Despite the urgings of their fearless leader to go “Onwards and upwards!” there were some distinct mutters of dissension amongst the ranks.

 

* * *

 

Anders grimaced as he lifted a foot off the ground gingerly. “We’ve been here forever,” he muttered sourly. “You know what I said about being glad to be out of Kirkwall? Well, I take it all back.”

He flopped down onto the warm sand with all the boneless grace of a jellyfish, seemingly oblivious that he had collapsed upon one of the more recent splotches of dried blood dotting the Coast. Hawke didn’t have the heart to tell him that it would probably be all over his coat by the time he got up. Or that the blood’s former owner was lying beside Anders, making a charming contribution to the scenery with his charred corpse.

“Ahhhh,” sighed Anders happily as he pulled off his boots. He peered at his feet with a critical eye. “You know, I think we’ve been walking _way_ too much. Even my blisters have blisters.”

The ever-stoic Fenris gave a snort that might even have been a laugh. When Hawke looked askance at him, Fenris merely shrugged. “The mage is right. We have been walking far too much.”

“What’s this?” exclaimed Anders with an overdramatic gasp, “Fenris is agreeing with me? Oh Maker, I must go write this momentous occasion down into my diary! I will treasure this precious moment until the day I die!”

“Which may be a lot sooner than you think if you don’t shut up now,” snarled Fenris.

“It’s amazing, Hawke,” said Varric conversationally, “You even managed to get those two to agree. Who knew that a forced march around the entire Wounded Coast could work such wonders? Perhaps we should do this more often? Wait no, don’t _ever_ do that. My feet are killing me. Do you know how many more steps I have to take to keep pace with all you tall people?”

He plopped himself down companionably next to Anders and the fire-blackened corpse, and leaned in conspiratorially to stage whisper to the mage, “I don’t think I’m going to include _this_ small detail in my epic chronicles of Hawke’s exploits. Way too boring. Also, ‘Hawke force-marched his poor tired friends around the entire Wounded Coast five times to find some little blue flowers’ doesn’t really have a heroic feel to it, does it?”

“I think this landscape has been seared onto the backs of my eyelids,” moaned Anders in response, “I could probably navigate the Wounded Coast blindfolded. In my sleep. Or after I’ve expired from walking-induced exhaustion. Whichever comes first.”

“People, people,” said Hawke, in one of his rare attempts to be diplomatic instead of plain silly, “Just hang in there for a little longer. How hard can it be to find some flowers? Surely you don’t want us to go back to Solivitus empty-handed? Can you imagine how devastated he will be? Can you? _Can you?_ ”

The glares that the other three men turned upon him were terrifying in their identical intensity. Hawke fought down the urge to quail and soldiered bravely on. “Anders!” he cried, sensing a potential ally, “You’re a healer! Think of all the potions and stuff Solivitus could make with these flowers! The lives that could be saved! The children! Think of the children!”

Anders quirked an eyebrow at Hawke. “You… _do_ know what these flowers are used for, don’t you, Hawke? I thought the way they were so fetchingly named should have clued you in.”

“Uhhh,” said Hawke, “Right.”

He surreptitiously unfurled the ingredients list that Solivitus had given him and darted a glance down. “Harlot’s… Blush?”

“Indeed,” said Anders, shooting a look at Hawke that implied he had all the intelligence of a particularly dull rock. “This flower is one of the chief ingredients for a salve that is normally used by the ladies of a certain establishment, as well as some of their more…unfortunate clientele.”

He cocked his head at Hawke. “I’d have thought you’d be more familiar with such things, given your many _associations_ with a certain pirate lady.”

“Isabela?”

Fenris groaned.

“Oh for the Maker’s sake, Hawke,” said Anders, “I don’t know whether you’re being deliberately dense, or all that walking under the hot sun has finally vaporized your brain.”

“Think about it, Hawke,” added Varric helpfully, “What would make a harlot blush?” He paused. “Not to imply that our lovely Isabela is a harlot. Though she does come quite close sometimes. And she most certainly does not blush.”

Hawke took longer than he cared to admit to come to the obvious conclusion. “Oh _damn_.”

“Got it in one, Hawke,” said Varric altogether too smugly, as he and Anders shared a conspiratorial grin.

Fenris continued to glare silently at Hawke, as though the sheer disapproving force of his gaze itself could bore straight through Hawke’s skull and eliminate any thoughts about helping the prostitutes of Kirkwall.

Hawke let out a nervous chuckle. “Prostitutes are people too?  And they deserve our help?”

“Certainly, Hawke,” said Anders pointedly, “But we’re not exactly helping by circling the same few spots in the Wounded Coast for the umpteenth time looking for a bunch of blue flowers that don't seem to exist.”

“What the mage said,” muttered Fenris.

“Blondie’s right,” said Varric unrepentantly. Hawke’s guts twisted at this unforgivable betrayal.

“Varric!” he cried, as his face crumpled, “Not you too?”

“Sorry, Hawke,” said the traitorous dwarf, “But Bianca and I just aren’t made for such heavy walking. Selfless nobility is a lot easier to stomach when your feet don’t feel as though they’ve been stampeded on by a herd of bronto. We’ll be heading to the Hanged Man for some extremely well-deserved rest.”

Anders nodded fervently beside him. “For a shamelessly incorrigible liar, you say the truest things sometimes, Varric.”

Hawke glared down at Anders and Varric as they sat happily on the bloodstained sand, united in their shared betrayal. He turned to Fenris. “So I suppose you’ll be heading off with them then?”

Fenris nodded solemnly, but his lips were twitching in the small but telling sign of a smile.

“Varric does owe me a drink.”

Hawke groaned and threw his hands up into the air. “With friends like this, who needs enemies?” he moaned in the most tortured and overdramatic voice he could muster.

“Oh, stop whining, Hawke,” said Varric, standing and clapping Hawke on the back. “I’m sure that with your awesome talents, keen wits and heroic determination, those stealthy flowers will never stand a chance. And then you’ll be able to join us in the Hanged Man triumphantly victorious. But until then, good luck with it.” He winked and then set off at a brisk pace, whistling a jaunty tune, as Anders and Fenris followed close behind.

Hawke glared at the hastily retreating forms of the traitorous fiends who called themselves his ‘allies’. For all their complaints about sore legs and inability to walk, they were certainly disappearing rather quickly.

 

He shook his head in disappointment and sighed glumly. “Oh well, guess it’s time to get the girls to help?”

 

* * *

 

“Hawke,” said Aveline, in a tone stern enough to melt steel. She trudged along behind him, armor glinting in the sun and clanking loudly with every darkly disapproving step. “There had better be a very good reason for making me take time off my many important duties as the Captain of the Guard to trek around the Wounded Coast. So far, we haven’t seen one single living bandit. And the dead ones haven’t even tried to jump us yet.”

Hawke chuckled nervously. So far, the local fauna hadn’t made any of its usual attempts on their lives. Perhaps it had something to do with the sheer number of trips Hawke had made to the Coast so far. It appeared that he had finally managed to clear the Coast of all its usual unsavory inhabitants. He never thought he would miss having wild Mabari trying to rip his throat out, or crazy Tal Vashoth wielding funny spears, but now the full force of Aveline’s furious disapproval made the former seem like a stroll on the hypothetically enjoyable (non-wounded) beach.

“I think we killed them all,” Merill piped up brightly. “I like it much better this way. At least we don’t have to fight anything anymore. It’s almost like Hawke’s actually bringing us somewhere for fun.” She gave a happy little sigh.

“I do so bring you to places for fun!” insisted Hawke, coming to a stop to turn back and stare at Merrill incredulously. “Like the Hanged Man! Isn’t that fun?”

Merill’s face fell. “I don’t really like it there, Hawke,” she said, staring at her bare feet as she wriggled her toes in the sand. “Playing Wicked Grace with Varric is fun and all, but I always lose. Drinking makes my head hurt. And a man once tried to buy me for 3 silvers.”

Hawke opened his mouth to protest, a finger jabbed into the air, before his brain processed what Merrill had just said. “Wha-?”

“Oh, ignore him, kitten,” said Isabela, placing a comforting hand on Merrill’s shoulder. “He’s just upset that we have more fun _without_ him.”

“Isabela!” squawked Hawke, “I can be fun! Tell them—I am so fun-“

“Fun or not, Hawke,” Aveline cut in, her voice sharp as the steel she was wearing, “You have to admit that _this_ is about the antithesis of fun. Why exactly have you brought us here?”

“Uh,” prevaricated Hawke, “I am on a very important mission to preserve the health and wellbeing of Kirkwall’s inhabitants.”

Aveline’s eyebrows begin their slow but steady rise up her temple.

“Ask Solivitus if you don’t believe me!” insisted Hawke. “It’s for medicine, Aveline! As captain of the guard, it your duty to help secure essential medicinal ingredients for the Kirkwall public!”

Aveline’s eyebrows hit the top of their trajectory and did not descend. “Is this about the harlot’s blush flowers that Varric told me you spectacularly failed to find after three trips to the Wounded Coast?”

“Uh, yes- no! No I mean-” said Hawke. Finally, he quailed under the force of Aveline’s stare and muttered, “…maybe?”

“Why do you even need us here, darling?” said Isabela, the traitor. “Not that I don’t enjoy your company, but we do have better things to do than trudge about in the stifling heat, looking for a bunch of small flowers that I’m sure plenty of other people with far keener eyes and far more time on their hands are more than capable of finding.”

“Hypocrite!” said Hawke, glaring at Isabela accusingly, “Just you wait till Solivitus runs out of his supply of salves—“

“I agree with Isabela,” said Aveline. And wasn’t this wonderful? Apparently the one thing that the usual quarrelers in his group of so-called allies could agree upon was their common opposition to Hawke’s current quest. “You’re an important man now. Surely you have more pressing matters to take care of than finding a bunch of blue flowers?”

“When you put it that way…” said Merrill thoughtfully, one delicate finger pressed to her pursed lips.

“Ladies,” said Hawke, “Right now there is nothing more important than finding those flowers on my agenda. It is a matter of pride that I find these flowers.” He turned to stare intently at each of the three women, and jabbed a finger into his palm to punctuate every sentence. “I made Solivitus a promise. A promise that I would get him his flowers. A promise that I fully intend to keep.” He gestured at his unimpressed audience beseechingly, “Do you want me to dishonor that promise? Do you?”

“I’ve been walking about under the sun in metal armor for three hours to look for a non-existent bunch of flowers when there’s a squad of new recruits I have to train,” said Aveline, “Tell me, does it really take four people just to look for some flowers? Sorry, Hawke, but you’re going to have to do this alone.”

“What? Aveline, you can’t just go—“

“I’m going too,” announced Isabela, darting in to press a quick kiss to Hawke’s cheek. “Meet you tonight at your estate, darling!”

“Isabela!” cried Hawke, stricken.

“Come on, kitten,” Isabela said as she took Merrill’s hand in hers. “Sorry, Hawke,” said Merrill, walking backwards in order to keep facing Hawke as Isabela led her away, a small, contrite smile on her face. Her big green eyes shone with sincerity. “The sand is really hot today and my feet are all sore.”

“There’s no need to apologize to that great lug,” Isabela informed her matter-of-factly, “He’s a slave-driver to make us come out in this heat.”

Hawke made a small wounded noise at the back of his throat.

“Toodles,” said Isabela.

 

Hawke sank into the sand dejectedly. Merrill was right- it really was quite hot. He let out a long, heartfelt groan.

 

* * *

 

Hawke had been unable to find Sebastian anywhere in the chantry, despite numerous visits. He had even gone so far as to ask the Grand Cleric about Sebastian’s whereabouts, only for her to look away uneasily and mutter something about Sebastian being on a… sabbatical.

Frustrated and at his wit’s end, Hawke was tempted to just give it up as a bad job and let Solivitus find his own damned flowers. However, his pride drove him to check just one last time.

He trudged through the same dull colorless landscape that seemed to constitute the entire Wounded Coast for what he promised himself was the very last time. Utter and complete silence surrounded him as he surveyed the good old boring sameness of his sandy surroundings. He had never realized how much he missed his companions’ easy bantering and inane remarks until they were gone. Hawke sighed… _again_. He seemed to be doing a lot of that these days.

He trekked up a hill, which he dimly recalled led up to a cave where he had once rescued Terrie’s friend from bounty hunters. Given the preponderance of caves in the Kirkwall area, all of which were muddling into a depressingly similar blur (Hawke could swear that some of the caves looked exactly the same, right down to the number of ferns growing on their damp lichen covered rocks), Hawke was surprised he could even remember this.

He reached the top of the slope, and stared. There was a man in a funny hat standing around what Hawke remembered as the remnants of a Tal-Vashoth camp. The robed man was standing arms-crossed in front of an overturned wagon, looking absolutely out of place with his funny hat and the _large shiny green and gold chest next to him_.

Hawke stared.

In his experience, there were only a few people with such unique sartorial taste and remarkable propensity for oddity. Hawke had noted that a penchant for funny looking hats, feathers and strange robes was directly correlated to one’s ability to produce fireballs from thin air. He had wondered before if the strange hats were some sort of new punishment devised by the Templars to make the mages even more miserable than they usually were. But it seemed that even the apostates were in on this fashion trend. Maybe the funny hats had magic-enhancing properties or something. Hawke would have to ask Anders or Merill about this mystery someday. Bethany had certainly never wanted in on that particular fashion trend before.

“Welcome, welcome,” said the strange man with the rather impressive moustache, “My name is Magus Taverin Hall. You wouldn’t happen to want to purchase any of my fine wares, would you?”

An idea hit Hawke. “Actually, would you happen to know where I could find some Harlot’s Blush? Small blue flower, about this big-“ He made a vague circular motion with his hands that in all likelihood more accurately described a small cat than a bunch of blue flowers “- very popular with the ladies of the night, if you know what I mean.” He winked at the other man and grinned hopefully.

The mage stared at him disapprovingly. “You certainly have the observational skills of a rock, young man. Perhaps this explains your apparent disinterest in my marvelous wares.” He huffed a sigh and said, in a long-suffering tone, “The Harlot’s Blush flowers can be found to my east. They are quite unmistakable, and very blue.”

“What?” protested Hawke, “But I checked that area hundreds of times!”

The mage scoffed. “Obviously not hard enough if you managed to miss them. What did you expect the flowers to do? Light up gold when you passed by?”

Hawke glared at the mage. He liked sarcasm far better when it wasn’t being directed at himself. “That would have been very helpful, yes.”

“Well, too bad,” said the other man and he added, a tad huffily, “Now were you planning to buy anything?”

“No,” said Hawke, “Why would you even set up a store here? In the middle of the Wounded Coast? In a small out of the way corner that used to be filled with dead Qunari?”

“I cater for a very particular class of customers,” said the mage with a glare. “Connoisseurs of the finest weaponry and artifacts, the stuff of legends, heroes of the ages! Not that _you_ seem to understand!” Even his moustache was twitching in anger. It was quite intimidating, really.

“Okaaay,” said Hawke, slowly backing away. “Well thanks so much for the directions, but I’ll be off now.”

 

He scarpered.

 

* * *

 

“Oh, you’re here alone,” said Solivitus in surprise, as Hawke approached his store, and he looked around curiously, as if he expected three other people to magically materialize behind Hawke from thin air. “Where’s your usual bunch of friends?”

“Friends? What friends?” Hawke said. “Oh you mean the traitors who usually tag along with me on my grand adventures and make silly remarks and drink my potions and take my stuff and occasionally kill things for me and then abandon me in my hour of need? Oh, those _friends_.”

“Uh, right,” said Solivitus, eyeing Hawke nervously, and edging away ever so slightly. He seemed to sense that this was a rather sore topic.

The silence stretched a little awkwardly before Hawke remembered the purpose of his visit and thrust the Harlot’s Blush flowers he had found at the mage. They were looking slightly worse for wear, and some of them were looking rather distinctly brown.

“I found your flowers,” he muttered.

“Oh, wonderful!” exclaimed Solivitus happily, the anxiety on his face morphing to pure joy in a spilt second as his gaze alighted on Hawke’s slightly wilted offering. “You found them! This will be ever so useful for my next batch of salves. I was just about running out. You’ve done me a great favour indeed, Serah Hawke.”

“Here,” he said, handing Hawke one gold piece as he took the drooping plants from Hawke’s hands. “Thank you so much for helping me! I know you’re a busy man, and you have so many far more important things to do around this city. It can’t have been easy taking time off your busy schedule to get these ingredients for me. I would go myself, but you know-” He waved a hand to encompass the Gallows and smiled brightly up at Hawke. “I hope you didn’t have too much difficulty finding them? They do grow very plentifully on the Wounded Coast, so I expect it wasn’t too much of a trouble.”

Hawke stared dolefully at the single gold piece sitting on his palm. “Oh no, it wasn’t _any_ trouble at all,” he said, “They were _everywhere_ , really. So many of them I was practically wading through a _sea_ of little blue flowers just to get out of the Wounded Coast.”

Thankfully, it seemed Solivitus was either immune to sarcasm, or too engrossed in thoughts of joy about all the lovely new potions he could brew to notice Hawke’s less than cheery response.

“Thank you again, Serah Hawke!” he chirped, “You have a good day!”

“Yeah,” said Hawke dully, “You too.”

It was time to hit the Hanged Man. He needed a good drink. And if any of the others tried to tease him one more time about the flowers, he would bloody well feed them to his Mabari.

He turned to leave.

“Oh, actually, Serah Hawke,” called Solivitus, “I _do_ have another favor to ask of you…It’s about this Varterral heart that I need-“

Hawke groaned.

**Author's Note:**

> This was started ages ago when I was still playing DA II and completed recently in a fit of schoolwork-induced procrastination. Don't know if it's just me and my selective blindness, but I had the hardest time finding the Harlot’s Blush flowers for the Herbalist’s Tasks II quest. It took me about 5 runs through the Wounded Coast map and a lot of frustrated cursing before I finally gave up and turned to the internet for help. Thank goodness for DA wiki is all I can say.


End file.
